MORGAN: THE TRANSFORMATION FROM SEXUALITY TO SOCIETY
Although anthropologists have always been interested in sexuality, they have not always been interested in studying it. A review of the pioneering works of Lewis Henry Morgan, the unilinear evolutionist, and Robert Lowie, an early critic of evolutionary theory, demonstrate this.
Morgan proposed a fifteen-stage evolutionary “in part hypothetical” sequence from a prefamilial stage of “promiscuous intercourse” to the “Monogamian Family,” the ultimate culmination of mankind. The hypothetical “Promiscuous intercourse” stage is low on the evolutionary scale, and it is not clear from Morgan’s account if he is talking about humankind, or a lower animal form:
Promiscuous Intercourse—This expresses the lowest conceivable stage of savagery—it represents the bottom of the scale. Man in this condition could scarcely be distinguished from mute animals by whom he was surrounded. Ignorant of marriage, and living probably in a horde, he was not only a savage, but possessed a feeble intellect and a feebler moral sense. . . . Were it possible to reach this earliest representative of the species, we must descend very far below the lowest savage now living upon the earth.
In contrast to “Promiscuous Intercourse,” a stage which “lies concealed in the misty antiquity of mankind”, is Morgan’s modern “Monogamian Family,” the final accomplishment in his history of human progress from savagery to civilization. At this stage, the paternity of children was assured, the joint ownership of real and personal property was introduced, and the inheritance by children was guaranteed. All known advances and institutions are related to this ultimate advance, for in Morgan’s own words, “Modern society reposes upon the monogamian family”.
Morgan’s theoretical goals included the refutation of the “degradation hypothesis” explanation of barbarian and savage populations found to be both physically and mentally below the standard of the supposed original man. Although Morgan treated sexuality as part of his larger argument, he did not set out to explore human sexuality as an important topic among contemporary peoples.
According to Morgan, the lowest conceivable stage of savagery was a stage of promiscuous, uncontrolled, unchecked sexuality. Such a stage of sexuality provided a theoretical counterpoint to the modern family, not to modern sexuality. Unrestrained sexuality among persons with a “feeble moral sense”, interacting in a prefamilial mode, is ultimately replaced by the institution of the modern, monogamian family. Morgan’s unmistakable point of departure is an attempt to document the transformation of raw animal sexuality into a multifaceted modern human social form. Progress is at the expense of sexuality; it does not incorporate it. For Morgan, the “facts of the human experience” are facts which show the institutions of family and government to have evolved from an earlier stage of unbridled sexual license.
One consequence of this reasoning is that anthropologists should study the family instead of sexuality, or ideas about sexuality. To the extent that modern theorists assume that sexuality is “under control” in every known society, the family and/or the mechanisms of control demand study, not sexuality itself. This seems to be a serious error in logic and a potentially serious deterrent to competent ethnography.
This epistemology which opposes or transforms sexuality into social organization is not easily relegated to the writings of one outmoded theorist; Morgan’s legacy is still with us. It is evident in the beginning sentence of Fox’s chapter on “The Incest Problem” in Kinship and Marriage: “If primary kin were allowed to mate, then many of the elaborate arrangements we are going to explore in this book would be unnecessary”. The implication is that kinship as we know it and study it would not exist, were sexual relations allowed in the family unit (outside of husband-wife). Stated in another way, the management of sexuality generates the primary structures of kinship and social organization which anthropologists have made as the core of their discipline. With or without tacit acknowledgment of the preempted role of a suppressed sexuality, anthropologists usually tend to address themselves to what sexuality hath wrought (kinship and social organization), rather than to how sexuality operates in a symbolic world, and how it perseveres as an important element of interpersonal relationship and ideology. This oversight finally was noticed in the important work of Schneider and Kemnitzer.
*129/187/5*
Random Posts
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.